Hurricane Sandy blows into Genesee County with high winds, rain

GENESEE COUNTY, MI – Get on your galoshes and long underwear, and hope the wind doesn’t blow your umbrella inside out.

Hurricane Sandy might not fly directly over Michigan, but the storm’s western edge is making its presence felt in Michigan.

In Genesee County, the hurricane means gusty, high winds, rain, and Red Cross workers heading to the East Coast.

The storm’s projected path had it pointed at several East Coast cities with an entire nation watching weather reports, stating the storm could charge northwest toward the Middle Atlantic Coast on Monday, heading inland along the Jersey Shore before early Tuesday morning.

Genesee County is under a wind advisory until 5 p.m. Tuesday, with wind speeds of 20 to 30 mph and gusts of 40 to 50 mph, said Sara Schultz, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service station in White Lake.

"Our main impact is going to be the high winds," she said.

Storms like Sandy don't happen often, but do occur on occasion, said Shultz, adding its impact in Michigan will drop off by the weekend.

"It won't be calm, but it will drop off," she said.

As of Monday evening, the impact to airline flights was minimal at Bishop Airport, although that was expected to change.

"We've got a couple of planes coming in early and a couple coming late," said Pat Corfman, airport spokeswoman. "So far, no cancellations."

The airlines will handle issues with canceled flights or delays because of the weather, Corfman said.

AirTran Airways, with flights to and from Flint, had canceled 23 flights nationwide as of Sunday night, according to a press release.

The carrier was projecting to cancel more than 180 departures out of almost 600 flights on Monday, according to the release.

Delta Air Lines had announced on Friday that passengers heading to or from locations on the East Coast could make one-time changes to travel schedules between Monday and Wednesday without incurring fees.

The flights can take place before or after the original dates, but must be ticketed and rescheduled for travel on or before Nov. 4, 2012.

"I expect it will change as the day goes on," Corfman said of the flight schedule. "I'm sure everything will change and probably not for the better. But so far, so good."

Volunteers, meanwhile, are being prepared to assist with efforts to help those in need on the east coast.

Janet Hamm, director of volunteer services for the local Red Cross chapter, said that the Genesee-Lapeer County chapter was contacted by the organization’s national deployment center and instructed to send its two-person emergency response team and its mental health worker to the Virginia region.

“The Genesee-Lapeer chapter is one of the few regional chapters with an available mental health worker,” Hamm said. “We have a standby of about 10 more people. We haven’t deployed any more out other than those three, but we could send many more depending on the amount of volunteers we have available and depending on the need.”

Carole Beauchamp, fleet specialist for the Red Cross, is part of the three-person team who was dispatched to Virginia from the Genesee-Lapeer chapter. Beauchamp will serve as the mental health chief for the Virginia region, but she could go as far north as Delaware of Maryland depending on the path of the storm.

Beauchamp’s husband, Dick, is also a staff member at the Red Cross, serving as the public information officer.

“(Carole’s) in upper-level management,” Dick said. “Generally, the upper-level management will all be there and they’ll have a team in place before the storm hits. Carole got there Saturday night and all of the flights were canceled around 5 p.m. Sunday, so no one else will be dispatched until the storm’s on hold.”

Dick said that he and his wife have been through deployment a number of times, and though he’s still not used to it, he knows that they do it to help save lives and assist people who are in need.

“This is her 30th time, so we’re not new to this, but there’s always a little unease knowing that that she’s going into the eye of the storm.”

Hamm said the chapter is still reaching out to its volunteers to see what how people they have available to send to the affected areas.

“I think the need is going to be quite high and widespread,” she said.

Temperatures will stay in the middle 40s through the week, which she said is "a little bit below normal at this time."

The chance for rainfall in the area will go from 60 percent on Monday
afternoon, to 90 percent Tuesday morning before dropping back down to
60 percent on Wednesday.

The National Weather Service is predicting between a tenth and a quarter of an inch of rainfall for Tuesday.

There are also gale warnings on the Great Lakes, with 13-foot waves predicted to reach 17 to 19 feet by Tuesday.

The storm warning on the Great Lakes ends Tuesday night, with waves
dropping to 12 feet and continuing to shrink through the rest of the
week.

The rain is predicted to let off by Saturday with some sunshine and temperatures in the mid-40s.